Monday, August 14, 2017

Here we are, a month and a half in to a Christmas in July I didn't have any plans to do until July 1st rolled around. Gotta love it when the stars align and something nice happens. Been a great month so far, but it's winding down fast. Only got a few days left, but I'm taking them one day at a time. Let's see what's in the pile tonight.

1. Sleigh Ride by Eddie Higgins With Milt Hinton And Bobby Rosengarden from the LP By Request (Statitas SLP 8079, Stereo, 1986). Nice, nice, nice version here. And it incorporates a small bit of Midnight Sleighride, a favorite of mine by Sauter-Finnegan (and others).

2. From Heaven Above To Earth I Come by Professional Chorus And Orchestra, Musical Director-Dale Warland, Organist-Paul Manz, from A Time For Singing (Commission On Worship And Church Music and The Commission On Public Communication Of The American Lutheran Church, Distributed Through Augsburg Publishing House 3xLP 5-5597, -5598, -5599, Stereo). Another track from this giant collection of hymns.

3. Baby It's Cold Outside by Buddy Clark, Duet With Dinah Shore, from the collection Buddy Clark's Greatest Hits (Columbia CS 9434, Electronically Re-Channeled For Stereo, 1967). Great duet, even if it has been edited down a bit. Somewhere I have the 78, and there's a bit of SFX at the beginning where the wind is blowing through an open door and I think a bit of dialog. That's why it seems to start rather abruptly.

4. Snow Deer (Rag) by Pete Handy from Honky Tonky Piano (Wing (Mercury) MGW 12201, Mono, 1958). This is actually a reissue on Wing that came out a few years after that 1958 which is when the original came out on Mercury. I couldn't find a date for the reissue.

5. On A Winter's Night by The Manitou Singers Of St. Olaf College Freshman Girls Chorus-Miss Alice Larsen, Director, from Manitou Singers (WCAL, St. Olaf College, Northfield, Minnesota RSLP 6781, Mono). I've been going through this large stack of records as we get near the end and trying to pick up and look at every single record. Many of the ones I thought were just another version of Ave Maria or a track from The Nutcracker are actually something a little more unique. This was one of those.

6. Jingle Bells by Robert Treyz And The Acton Promenaders from the LP Square Dances With Calls (Spin-O-Rama M 3037, Mono). Though this was on a budget label, I was actually able to find a mention of a Bob Treyz in a town called Acton in a square Dance journal from around 1957. Maybe they really did hire him to make this record. I wouldn't have expected it, but there he was.

7. In A Little Clock Shop by Dick Leibert from Music In A Mellow Mood (Camden (RCA) CAL 200, Mono). Not really a Christmas song, but Dick included this song on one of his Christmas albums for Westminster, so I decided to throw it in here.

8. I Wonder As I Wander by The University Of Delaware Concert Choir Directed By Ivan Trusler-Carolyn Brown, Accompanist-James Hughes, Soloist, from The University Of Delaware Symphonic Band And Concert Choir (Recorded Publications 32M-28781/28782, Mono). Another song from a locally produced recording.

9. Hirmus Of The Christmas Ode: My Soul Does Magnify by Spyridon Péristéris, First Chapter Of The Athens Cathedral, With Chorus And "Issokratima" Accompaniment, from Hymnodia-Byzantine Hymns Of The Greek Orthodox Church (Philips A 02219 L, Mono). The actual title of this one was something written in Greek that I would have spent forever trying to figure out the characters. Sorry. You'll probably never listen to it a second time.

10. Christmas Mouse, a short poem from Aileen Fisher and the album Poetry Parade-Poets Read Their Poetry For Children (Weston Woods Studios 2xLP ww703 & ww704, Mono). Still not quite done with this one yet.

12. God Rest You Merry, Gentlemen by Oratorio Chorus Of The Guelph Light Opera Company-Charles M. Wilson, Mus. Doc., Director, from Oratorio Chorus Of The Guelph Light Opera Company (Guelph Light Opera Company GLOC 1968, Stereo). A third one that I'm trying to finish up before the end.

13. Overture Miniature
14. March
15. Dance Of The Sugar-Plum Fairy
16. Trepak
17. Arabian Dance
18. Chinese Dance
19. Dance Of The Flutes
20. Waltz Of The Flowers, all by The Hollywood Bowl Symphony Orchestra Conducted By Felix Slatkin, and all taken from the LP Nutcracker Suite/A Midsummer Night's Dream (Capitol SP-8404, Stereo, 1957). I think I mentioned yesterday or the day before that I was sharing a mono version of the last track from this suite pulled from a compilation LP. Well, tonight I found the original stereo LP in the stack and figured I'd record it and share it out all in one go. So we're back up to 20 tracks for the day, it's just that eight of them are by the same artist and from the same album. Hope that's OK

Anyhow, that's your stack of music for the night. I'm sure there will be some stuff in there you can't live without. And maybe some stuff that you only ever listen to once. Here's the link, have fun!

hirmus of the christmas ode wasn’t too bad. i guess it was in greek which i don’t understand. these old chants are usually in latin and i don’t understand that either. (‘my father can beat your father at dominos’ is about the extent of my latin chanting.) so what’s the dif? i was impressed with the quality of the freshman girls chorus of st olaf. (just think what the sophomores must sound like!) usually schools dump as many warm bodies as possible into the choir so that more parents and relatives will buy performance tickets and, in this case, records. st olaf seems to have taken a more discretionary approach.

i used to watch ‘polka go round’ on tv in the late 50s. my older sisters (for whom music was top 40 or nothing) would come in the room and make puke faces and demand i change the channel. but over time, i did glean a passing familiarity with square dance music. and i can say this about christmas square dance music: it is square.

Got Vinyl?

Ernie's Christmas record want list. There might be something in that stack of Christmas records you want to throw out that I need. Actually, there's a lot more that I need that I don't know about, so send 'em all to me (especially singles)! (Revised 03 March 2018)